The first case of birth defect microcephaly linked to the mosquito-borne Zika virus has appeared in Colombia, a doctor said on Friday, although the national health institute said it had no information on the case and could not confirm it, according to Reuters. Colombia, seen as a key test case of the impact of the virus, has 42,706 cases of Zika, including 7,653 pregnant women. A study of 28 women in Colombia's Sucre province infected with Zika during pregnancy has so far yielded one baby with microcephaly, said Alfonso Rodriguez-Morales, a doctor and researcher at the Technical University of Pereira. It was not immediately known when the child was born. One case does not prove an overall link between the virus and microcephaly, Rodriguez-Morales told Reuters in a phone interview, but his team has ruled out other potential causes of the defect in this child, including rubella, herpes, syphilis and toxoplasmosis. The two other babies born to women in the study had cranial defects that are being investigated and could not so far be linked to Zika, Rodriguez-Morales said.
